Language man working on Aboriginal languages occasionally sharing his thoughts...

October 15, 2008

Indigenous TV back on line ... nearly

When they launched NITV (National Indigenous Television) a lot of people were happy but a loud minority were upset because it coincided with the end of years of ICTV (Indigenous Community Television) which did heaps of remote broadcasting, provided training and employment for community mob and provided heaps of broadcasting in Indigenous Languages. Here's a bit of discussion from last year about ICTV's closure.

So now we have NITV which is alright (the highlight is seeing familiar faces pop up regularly... especially good when it's 80s footage of ppl very close to you... hehehe), but NITV is very low on Indigenous language content, heavy on urban-based stuff and does little for remote Aboriginal Australia especially in terms of training and employment.

The good news is I was sent an email telling me that ICTV is online... or at least the radio part. Fingers crossed and there'll be lots of deadly language video content online soon.

3 comments:

I have to disagree with your comments regarding the demise of ICTV. In remote desert Australia kids could see family who now had to live in town due to illness and be told stories of their country in language. As you said - familiar faces.Now no-one out here except whitefellas watch NITV.

I agree that ICTV was the best thing for remote communities. It was in language and was about their communities, Walpiri, PY media etc providing real programs that were of interest to those people and communities.

NITV has a different agenda and is basically for urban Indigenous/white people and does not include the needs of our desert bush mob.

Bush mob want to see programs in their own language and stories that reflect their communities and the issues that go with those communities.

As one Pintubi man said to me" We dont watchum whitefulla TV it bin rot our brain we want to watch our own mob, Its important for culture"

Perhaps we will see the return of piracy TV again like they did at Pit homelands in the 80s